A life stained by stigma,
now rich in love
A positive HIV diagnosis left Bradford McIntyre ostracized and isolated; but because of St. Paul's pioneering research and treatment, he can now lead an almost normal life.
By Cheryl Chan, The Province
Bradford McIntyre, right, is HIV-positive, but still found love. He stands with husband Deni Daviau and their marriage certificate in their Vancouver home.
Photograph by: Arlen Redekop, PNG ,
October 21, 2012 - At first blush, Bradford McIntyre and Deni Daviau appear to have an ordinary love story.
The Vancouver couple met online, dated for a year, were married in church and have been happily married for 11 years.
A run of the mill love story, except for one thing. McIntyre and Daviau are a mixed couple: McIntyre is HIV-positive; Daviau, HIV-negative.
"We are a serodiscordant couple, we are a lot of things, but the No. 1 thing is we are in love," an exuberant McIntyre said in their West End home.
"We are more in love today than we have ever been."
McIntyre was diagnosed with HIV in 1984, at age 33. He contracted the virus from the first person with whom he was intimate after getting out of a 10-year relationship.
His prognosis was bleak: his doctor told him to go home, inform his family, arrange his finances and his funeral because he had six months to live.
He had two relationships fall apart. Both partners told him they did not want to watch him die, recalled McIntyre.
"Due to the stigma associated with HIV, people usually ran as fast as they could when I told them I was HIV-positive," said McIntyre. "You could say it had a negative effect on having a relationship," he added wryly.
McIntyre wouldn't be alive - much less have a love life - had it not been for the groundbreaking research and treatment developed at St. Paul's Hospital.
Today, the tanned, handsome McIntyre looks fit and healthy, one of 13,000 people known to be living with HIV in B.C.
McIntyre wasn't sick immediately after his diagnosis. He began taking medication to keep the cunning virus at bay, but the pills had brutal side-effects, including neuropathy, headaches, fatigue and lipodystrophy - facial wasting that made him look gaunt and dying.
In 1997, McIntyre developed PCP, or pneumocystis pneumonia, a life-threatening lung infection that typically assails people with HIV. "I was dying," said McIntyre. "I was not able to tolerate the treatment for the pneumonia."
He was put on a new drug regimen, a combination therapy pioneered at St. Paul's Hospital, in the hopes it would eradicate enough of the virus to let his ravaged immune system fight off the opportunistic infection.
Within four weeks, McIntyre's white blood cell counts started to rise. He eventually recovered, got out of hospital and went on to live his life.
"They all died"
It wasn't always that way.
Jane McCall, who used to work in St. Paul's emergency department, remembers admitting the first person in B.C. known to have HIV, a 30-year-old named Brian.
"He died," she said. "Because they all died."
After Brian, scores more young men began coming to St. Paul's - sick, symptomatic, suffering from PCP and sarcomas and infections.
"They were often blind, having lost their sight," said McCall. "They had horrible diarrhea. They looked like concentration camp victims. They'd weigh 50 kilograms. It was awful."
Many of the patients worked at St. Paul's and knew the grim outcome. Some committed suicide, said McCall.
The West End hospital became synonymous with HIV/AIDS care in Vancouver - by virtue of its location in the epicentre of
Vancouver's gay community, but also because the nuns, guided by its mission of compassionate care, insisted the hospital's
doors be thrown wide open at a time when other hospitals turned patients away.
At the time, HIV/AIDS was a death sentence, an illness shrouded in fear and misconception. Care was nothing more than
palliative, monitoring patients during their decline toward death. But in 1996, a new triple drug cocktail, known as highly active
antiretroviral therapy, changed the game.
Triple Drug Cocktail life-saver
But in 1996, a new triple drug cocktail, known as highly active antiretroviral therapy, changed the game.
"When we introduced HAART, the death rate decreased and life expectancy improved markedly," said Dr. Julio Montaner,
director of the B.C. Centre for Excellence in HIV/AIDS, who helped pioneer the drug cocktail.
HAART suppressed HIV to undetectable levels, stopped its progression into full-blown AIDS and turned the killer disease into
a chronic condition.
"After years of people coming here and dying routinely, we couldn't believe it," said McCall. "It was a miracle - plain and simple."
Montaner and St. Paul's campaigned for the expansion of HAART, offering it to patients earlier instead of waiting until they show symptoms. It resulted in a 90 per cent decrease in the mortality rate, and 80 per cent decrease in the number of AIDS cases.
HAART also had an unexpected benefit: It suppressed the virus to a degree it reduced transmission by a whopping 96 per cent. Recent studies have indicated it is closer to 100 per cent. "It's better than a vaccine," said Montaner.
Today HAART is the gold standard in HIV treatment. Its early use with a goal of decreasing transmission, dubbed Treatment as Prevention, has been embraced by former U.S. president Bill Clinton, the World Health Organization
and countries such as China and Swaziland, which are battling the spread of the epidemic.
Thanks to the approach, as well as aggressive outreach to high-risk populations and widespread testing, B.C. is the only
province in Canada where the rate of new infections declined since 1996.
"I have every expectation it will be lower in 2012, 2013, 2014 and thereafter," said Montaner.
It was three years after getting on HAART that McIntyre met Daviau.
After the two failed relationships, McIntyre stayed
single for nearly a decade. He wasn't looking for a relationship when he met Daviau in an online chat room on spirituality. The pair
met up when they found out they lived only five blocks away from each other.
McIntyre, an HIV/AIDS activist, was frank about his status from the start. The diagnosis did not faze Daviau, who
fell in love with McIntyre's "positively positive" attitude.
"He was full of life and joy. He has this amazing zest for life, even having to deal with a disease like this," said
Daviau, 57.
Even though McIntyre is HIV-positive and Daviau negative, transmission is not an issue because HAART has reduced McIntyre's
viral load to almost nil. The couple also practice safe sex.
On June 2, 2001, a year after dating, McIntyre and Daviau got married at St. John's United Church. Gay marriage was not
legal in Canada at the time, so last year, the couple made it official by renewing their vows.
McIntyre said living with HIV is still not easy. He has to adhere to a drug regimen twice a day.
There are side-effects and occasional health problems and the niggling worry he might develop resistance to the drugs.
But the ups and downs and stresses that came along with being HIV have made their relationship stronger, he said.
"Two weeks before we got married, I said to Deni, 'If we could have a year,'" said McIntyre.
"Now here we are. And I'm not ready to stop."
Read more...
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Source:
The Province
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